Chapter Eight
Cord
The second day without pills felt like someone had replaced my nervous system with live electrical wire.
Not the dramatic, movie-version hell I'd expected.
Just this constant, low-grade buzz under my skin that made everything feel wrong.
The coffee pot gurgled too loud. Birds outside the window sounded like they were screaming.
Dusty humming while he scrambled eggs made me want to throw something against the wall.
I poured coffee with hands that shook just enough to piss me off. The mug was heavy ceramic, rough under my fingers, and I gripped it too tight because loose felt like losing control.
“How'd you sleep?” Dusty asked, not looking up from the stove where the eggs sizzled in a cast iron pan.
“Like shit.”
“Want to talk about what kept you up?”
“No.”
He kept cooking like I hadn't just bitten his head off. That easy patience made me want to push harder, see what it would take to crack that zen bullshit. Find his breaking point since I couldn't seem to find mine.
“Eggs are almost ready,” he said, sliding them onto a plate with practiced ease.
I took my coffee to the deck, needing air.
The morning was crisp, that clean mountain smell that used to calm me down.
Instead, my chest was tight, like someone was sitting on it.
Everything was too much—too bright, too sharp, too fucking present.
Like someone had cranked all the settings in my brain to maximum and broken the dial.
Through the window, I watched Dusty plate food with the same careful attention he gave everything. His hands were steady, sure. Everything about him screamed competence while I could barely hold a coffee cup without my fingers twitching.
My phone sat dead on the kitchen counter where Dusty had suggested I leave it. Yesterday that had seemed smart. Today it felt like being buried alive. No connection to the outside world, no escape route, no distractions from the noise in my head that just kept getting louder.
“Thought maybe we could try some breathing exercises after breakfast,” Dusty said, stepping onto the deck with two plates, steam rising from the eggs.
“I'm breathing fine.”
“Your shoulders are touching your ears.”
I forced them down, which lasted maybe thirty seconds before they crept back up. The eggs smelled good but my stomach was full of broken glass. “I need to move around.”
“Okay. Want to explore the property? There's a nice trail that loops through the woods.”
“Fine. Whatever gets me out of this place.”
The cabin felt like a cage, all those windows looking in instead of out, walls too close together, air too thin. I dumped the eggs in the trash when Dusty wasn't looking and followed him into the trees.
The trail was narrow, dirt packed hard by years of use.
I followed Dusty in his jeans and t-shirt, his hair knotted up on top of his head, with a stupid mini-backpack slung around one shoulder.
Dried leaves crunched under my feet, oak and cedar, brittle from the Texas heat, and something about the sound helped, gave my brain a rhythm to follow instead of spinning in circles.
My legs remembered what it was like to have purpose, even if it was just putting one foot in front of the other.
For maybe ten minutes, the physical motion kept the edge off. Then my brain kicked back in—worry spiraling about my career, about what sports reporters were saying, about whether I was having some kind of breakdown that normal people just powered through without running off to cabins in the woods.
“Vincent mentioned there's a bigger stream about a mile up,” Dusty said, stepping around a prickly pear cactus, its flat pads dotted with tiny spines that gleamed in the morning light.
“Great.” The word came out sharper than I meant.
“You're pissed at me.”
“I'm not pissed at you.” Except I was, and I didn't even know why. Maybe because he looked so fucking calm while my skin didn't fit right. “I'm pissed at this whole situation.”
“What situation?”
“Being here. Needing help. Having to talk about my feelings like some therapy patient instead of just dealing with shit like an adult.”
“You are dealing with it.”
“No, I'm hiding from it. There's a difference.”
The trail curved uphill through scrub oak and cedar, limestone jutting up through the thin soil.
My breathing got heavier. Not from exertion—I was in better shape than most people half my age—but from everything else.
The way Dusty kept glancing at me like I might explode.
The way every sound felt amplified. The way I couldn't stop thinking about those pills with my name on them sitting in a Denver pharmacy and how much quieter everything would be if I had them.
“I asked you to help me get through a couple of rough days,” I said, needing to fill the silence. “Not psychoanalyze my entire existence.”
“I'm not—”
“Yes, you are. Every question, every concerned look. Like I'm some wounded bird you found on the side of the road.”
Dusty stopped walking. Live oaks spread their branches overhead, leaves rustling in the breeze. The air smelled like cedar and dust and something earthy I couldn't name. “Is that what you think this is?”
“Isn't it?” I turned to face him, spoiling for a fight. My hands were clenched at my sides and I could feel my heartbeat in my throat. “You get to be the healer, I get to be the broken athlete. Satisfying for your savior complex.”
His jaw tightened, first crack in that calm facade. “That's not fair.”
“Fair?” I laughed but there was no humor in it, just this harsh sound that echoed through the trees. “Nothing about this is fair. I'm twenty-seven years old, hiding in the woods because I can't handle being sober for forty-eight hours without losing my shit.”
“You're not—”
“I'm not what? Falling apart? Because that's exactly what this is.” The words came out louder than I intended, disturbing a mockingbird from somewhere in the oak canopy.
It fluttered away, its wings catching sunlight between the branches.
“This is me falling apart because I can't take a hit without pills to shut up the noise in my head.”
My chest started getting tight. That familiar feeling of walls closing in, air getting thin, like someone was turning a vise around my ribs. I knew what was coming but I couldn't stop it, couldn't control it, couldn't do anything but watch it happen.
“Cord—”
“I need to go back.”
“Back to the cabin?”
“Back to Denver. Back to real life. This was stupid.” I turned around and started back down the trail, fast. Like I could outrun the panic that was building in my chest like a storm front.
“Hey.” Dusty caught up, didn't try to stop me but kept pace. His footsteps were steady while mine felt erratic, rushed. “You're okay.”
“I'm not okay. That's the whole fucking problem.”
“You're having a panic attack.”
“I know what I'm having.” But my breathing was getting shallow, rapid. Heart hammering against my ribs like it was trying to break free. The trail blurred at the edges and I stumbled over a root I should have seen coming.
We reached the cabin, and I bolted for the porch steps, needing something solid under me before my legs gave out. The wood was rough and warm from the morning sun, real in a way that helped anchor me when everything else was spinning.
“Four counts in,” Dusty said, settling beside me on the steps.
“Don't.”
“Hold for four.”
“I said don't.” But my voice came out shaky and I hated how weak it sounded.
“Out for six.”
Despite myself, I tried to match his rhythm. It took several attempts. My lungs kept wanting to grab for air instead of releasing it, but the crushing feeling in my chest started to ease. The world stopped tilting and my heartbeat slowed from jackhammer to something closer to normal.
“Better?”
I nodded because I didn't trust my voice yet. The adrenaline was draining out of me, leaving behind this shaky exhaustion that made my bones feel hollow.
“Want to tell me what set that off?”
“Everything.” I wiped sweat from my forehead with the back of my hand. “Nothing. I don't know. I just...” The words stuck in my throat.
“You don't have to explain it.”
“Yeah, I do. Because otherwise, you're going to think I'm some head case who can't handle a simple hike without freaking out.” The admission tasted bitter.
I'd spent my entire adult life being the guy who could handle anything: pressure, pain, media scrutiny.
Now I couldn't even walk through the woods without having a meltdown.
Dusty shifted beside me, close enough that his shoulder brushed mine. “I don't think you're a head case. I think you're going through some withdrawal and dealing with a lot of unprocessed trauma at the same time.”
“That's a nice way of saying I'm falling apart.”
“No, that's a way of saying you're human.” He paused, then added, “You know what I see when I look at you? Someone who's been holding up the weight of the world for so long that he forgot he's allowed to put it down sometimes.”
The words hit me harder than they should have. I stared at my hands, still shaking, and something cracked open in my chest. Not the panic this time. Something else. Something like grief mixed with relief mixed with exhaustion so deep it went all the way to my bones.
“I don't know how to put it down.”
“I know.” He was quiet for a moment, and when he spoke again, his voice had changed. Softer, more uncertain. “My dad… after his accident, after the pills started. He used to say the same thing. That he didn't know how to just be hurt without fixing it. Without performing 'fine' for everyone.”
I turned to look at him. In all our sessions, all the hours we'd spent together, Dusty had kept the focus on me. This was the first time I'd heard real pain in his voice when he talked about his father.
“What happened to him?”